I do both, for both glasses and decanters, but my normal MO is to put glasses in the dishwasher and hand-wash the decanter. Only when the decanter starts to look a bit stained do I put it in the dishwasher.

I do the same as Roy. I machine wash my glasses, but hand wash the decanters. I am not even sure why, except that the glasses easily fit in the dishwasher, but the decanters do not. They are too "top heavy" and unstable when put upside-down in the machine.

Occasionally I'll run my Reidels through the dishwasher just to give 'em a good blasting, but since I normally reuse the same glass every night it's easier to hand wash it than run the dishwasher every day.

I handwash my IVDP glasses, although I suppose they could go in the dishwasher. Lesser glasses go in the machine, and we have some other stems that won't fit.

Eventually the dishwasher will leave a residue on glass that you can't remove. On the other hand, the automatic dishwasher soap does rinse off more easily than hand soap, which isn't such a factor for wine, but can kill beer head. Whenever I hand wash glasses, I always invert and thoroughly rinse with a sprayer.

I usually put glasses in the dishwasher; if doing a lot of them, I'll sometimes add a second run with a rinse again just to remove residual soap.

The decanters are always hand washed and I never put soap into the inside. I also took a 1 x 6, drilled and inserted a dowel so I can dry my decanters upside down so as not to get any mineral deposits on the bottom.

So what do you guys do to remove the stains that eventually form in your decanters?

Although you may thing this sounds nuts, twice a year, I take a capful of bleach and pour it into about 64 oz. of water and pour that into 3 decanters. I swirl it around and let them sit for about fifteen minutes and then pour that liquid into another decanter until all have gone through the process. I then rinse them out thoroughly several times in hot water and finally a couple of times in cold water. It has returned my dull and stained decanters to looking like new. Twice a year seems to work for me.

Roy Hersh wrote:So what do you guys do to remove the stains that eventually form in your decanters?

That's where the PBW comes in. It dissolves organics and protein. Although not a cleaner, I also have StarSan, an acid, which can dissolve other stuff. After that, I suppose I could use CLR, but I've never had to for a decanter. Better living through chemestry